


Car Crash Hearts

by rayemars



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Casual Sex, Complicated Relationships, M/M, Under-negotiated Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2019-12-08
Packaged: 2021-02-24 16:15:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21720805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rayemars/pseuds/rayemars
Summary: Three weeks after the first time he had sex with Parse, one of the guys texted the closeted gay NHL players' group chat with a string of laughing-crying faces, which was always a sign that somebody was about to get chirped.And then John wrote:Hey Tater apparently you suck at getting blowjobs???I mean Parse said your alright at handys but like. How do you fuck up *getting* a bj bud??LIE!!!Lyosha wrote back, outraged.The one where Alexei "Tater/Lyosha" Mashkov and Kent "Parse" Parson have known each other (insert 'in the Biblical sense' joke here) for years during their respective careers in the NHL, with increasingly tumultuous results over time.
Relationships: Alexei "Tater" Mashkov/Kent "Parse" Parson, Ambiguous or Implied Relationship(s)
Comments: 46
Kudos: 164





	1. Chapter 1

Sleeping with Parson is a mistake Lyosha keeps making.

*

It started at the 2011 All-Stars weekend. That was the first time they met outside of a game.

Lyosha was back in North America for his rookie NHL season, after playing his obligatory years for the Superleague. It was his first All-Stars weekend; he'd exploded into the Falconers' lineup with a good collection of goals and assists, even if he had more penalty minutes than his coaches liked.

Lyosha bought two of his All-Stars-variant Mashkov jerseys and mailed them to his parents, deeply proud of being selected in his very first year in the league. The jerseys didn't make it to Nizhny Novgorod in time for the weekend, but his mama emailed him a picture of her and his papa wearing them a couple weeks later.

It was Parse's second All-Stars. He'd been selected last year too, during his own rookie year.

The Falcs had played Vegas once so far in Lyosha's rookie season. Parse had a three-point night against them, scoring a goal and sending two assists to his teammates, who wound up scoring on Snowy. Lyosha already knew he was good.

He also already knew Parse was gay.

There was a text chat among most of the small number of NHL players who liked men. Lyosha had been initially linked into it by a bi friend who was eventually asked to leave by a couple of the guys after Zhenya married his girlfriend, even though the majority of the players in there kept sending Zhenya the chat's gossip on their own.

Parse wasn't in the group. John said he'd told Parse about it during the previous summer, after Parse had off-handedly invited John to his upcoming birthday party while they were doing their photoshoots for a mutual endorsement; but Parse had told John he was good.

Some guys did that. They knew about the chat, but they preferred to go it solo through their career. Lyosha wasn't sure if their choice was made from a fear of getting caught in a mass outing if the chat was ever discovered, or if it was because of a real grudge with some other guy already in there, or if it was because they already had a good circle of friends who knew about them and so they didn't need the company. But Lyosha usually hoped it was the last one.

Moving to North America as a teenager to play in Canada's Juniors program had been so jarring to Lyosha that he's not sure he would've survived his homesickness if not for the Russian strength coach on his team. Kolya had translated for Lyosha during those first several months, and he'd also rode Lyosha's ass about practicing his English as much as he'd pushed Lyosha on his conditioning.

Kolya's family and friends were Lyosha's first support group in North America. They'd remained a big part of his most trusted inner circle, even as Lyosha's social and friend groups expanded over the years.

But even then, he'd never told Kolya he was gay. Back when he was a teenager, Lyosha had still been hoping those feelings would just go away and he'd start liking girls the way he was supposed to.

He grew out of that, but he still never said anything to Kolya. Sometimes Lyosha suspected that Kolya's wife had figured it out, but Oksana let Lyosha keep his secrets. They both knew what Kolya's politics were.

While Lyosha was playing in the World Juniors' series prior to that summer's draft, Kolya invited a friend's family over for holiday dinner. Seryozha brought along Zhenya.

Zhenya quickly figured Lyosha out. But he also took pity on him--despite Lyosha's painfully obvious hero worship--and looped him into the group chat.

There were only a couple Russians on there, and yet. That was more countrymen than seventeen-year-old Lyosha ever would have imagined.

The group chat had been a lifeline for him as a teenager growing into a young man. He'd been too shy to say anything in it at first, unless one of the Russians actively dragged him into a discussion, and yet. He wasn't as alone as he thought he would be, out of his parents' home and gay and in a foreign country.

Nikusha had left the group in protest when Zhenya was pushed out, and so had one of the Canadians who was always bouncing between the NHL and AHL. Lyosha almost left too; but there were ultimately too many people in it that he'd known for too long, and who'd been too big a part of his life even if they rarely physically met, for him to be able to follow through.

He only stopped feeling guilty about staying when Zhenya told him he didn't care. It had hurt Zhenya, yes, but after that sting faded he understood why the guys who didn't also like women were mad that he got to 'take the easy way out' and still marry someone he loved. Zhenya thought they were being stupid, but he understood.

The group chat meant a lot to Lyosha, even if sometimes he wound up ignoring it for a while when the drama was off the charts. It was a place where there were other people who understood what it felt like both to be a hockey player in the NHL and to be gay.

So whenever a guy didn't want to join, Lyosha hoped that it was because they were like Zimboni--that they already had a solid external group they were a part of. Not because they were trying to lone wolf it through the league for any negative reasons.

Even if the guy was Kent Parson.

*

It started at the 2011 All-Stars because even though Parse had turned down John's invitation to join the group chat, he'd still hooked up with him during his birthday party.

Or so John claimed, making the mistake of saying that Parse was worth a shot if you liked blowjobs. He was consequently chirped by multiple guys for being a cradle-robber, until John finally got fed up and started only replying in idgaf gifs.

Lyosha saved a few of the good ones he didn't already have. He used one while chirping Snowy a couple days before he had to fly out to Raleigh for the long weekend, which was probably why he remembered that conversation enough to start thinking about Parse and blowjobs.

Sometimes he told himself that he was stupid to do that, but things were different in 2011. Lyosha had given Parse the benefit of the doubt back then.

Parse--the Aces' twenty-year-old sophomore forward and newly-minted captain--was charming and laid-back during the weekend, joking around with guys and relaxed in his media pieces. You wouldn't know he was youngest American-born captain in the league just from talking to him.

You wouldn't know he was one of the youngest captains in NHL history, third only to Crosby and Lecavalier. You wouldn't know he'd already broken American and NHL records before he was even legal to drink in the U.S.

Parse off the ice was a different person than the vicious player he acted like on it. Lyosha had been dubious about him at first; but he'd wound up liking Parse despite himself during the times they'd talked over the weekend.

Part of it was Lyosha's automatic response to a challenge. If you could get Parse interested in you, he might let you shoulder in through a crack in his calm and humble persona, and let you have a taste of his slyly chirping sense of humor. Lyosha'd overheard his first hit of it during media day, when they were signing posters: Lyosha was at the Falcs' table while Parse and a teammate were at the Aces', needling each other about their signatures.

"It's gonna take you all night to do this," Swoops had retorted. "I should just go to dinner. What d'you want me to bring back?"

"At least my signature's legible."

"Mine's legible! It just doesn't take me a minute to write it out."

"That's not a signature, that's a scrawl," Parse had drawled. "Not even a scrawl. You hold a pen and wiggle it for a couple seconds. Terrible hands. What's the opposite of silky?"

Swoops had snorted. Parse added, "Lead hands. Just terrible. It's gonna be so embarrassing watching you at skills tomorrow. I'm gonna hafta turn my jersey inside out to hide my shame."

He'd lifted the pen from the poster he was signing a moment later. Swoops had shouldered him in the side, making a face and clearly trying not to show he was amused. Parse'd just smirked and flipped aside the poster to start signing a new one.

Lyosha had kept working at his own table, but he didn't hide how he was openly snickering.

Parse had glanced up and met his eyes, still with that little teasing smile on his lips. And then he'd held Lyosha's gaze for a few seconds, before looking back down at the poster and dryly replying to whatever his teammate had said to him.

And, well.

Lyosha wasn't the kind of man to ignore an open lane when he saw one.  
  
  
It helped that Lyosha had his own hotel room that weekend.

Marty was supposed to be coming to the All-Stars with him. But Marty's knee had been bothering him more after a blocked shot in December; and after talking with the Falcs' trainer and their head coach, he'd decided to turn down his selection and spend the long weekend recuperating instead.

It drew the league's automatic penalty for not attending, forcing Marty to sit out the Falcs' last game before the weekend. But the schedule was in their favor: their opponent was a team at the bottom of the Atlantic division that season. They won even with Marty stuck watching the game from the press box.

A small, selfish part of Lyosha wished that Marty had come anyway. The All-Stars weekend was huge, with a massive schedule and more fans than Lyosha'd ever interacted with since his last Worlds Juniors game. And he was still working on recovering a lot of the English he'd lost when he returned to Russia after his Juniors years in Ontario.

Marty had been to the All-Stars before. He could've helped Lyosha out when he blanked on words in the English interviews. He probably wouldn't have pranked Lyosha too much for being a newbie.

But on the other hand, a solo hotel room. That was a luxury Lyosha'd never had before.

He took full advantage of it: taking the best bed to see the TV, dumping his luggage across the other mattress, using as many towels as he wanted in the bathroom.

He didn't think to clean before ramping up his attempts to get close to Parse over the next day. When Lyosha's very charming flirting had helped him sweet-talk Parse into coming over to his room after the skills test that night, Parse gave the room a long look with one eyebrow raised.

"My room," Lyosha repeated defensively. He'd already told Parse about the situation when he'd asked if Parse wanted to come back to his hotel room for dessert; but, well, okay. Maybe he could have moved the luggage, at least.

"Uh-huh," Parse said dryly.

"Okay, _captain_ ," Lyosha retorted, maybe a fraction sulkily. If the Aces were giving Parse his own hotel room regularly on roadies, good for him, but Lyosha would get there eventually too. Parse just snickered.

But then Parse started flipping through the room service menu on the desk. "You like cheesecake?"

«Uh,» Lyosha replied, suddenly and abruptly concerned that his flirting game was not as good in English as he thought. Had he been too literal? Had he misinterpreted, and yesterday Parse had just been noting another person in the room who was amused to hear a couple teammates' chirping? Well, shit.

Well, if Lyosha'd been too literal, Parse was still in his room. He had time to either make things clear, or back away if he'd misread the signals. "Yes. Is good kind?"

"What's the 'good kind'?"

"Strawberries," Lyosha said decisively, and Parse laughed.

"Not with caramel?"

Lyosha made a face. Parse snorted again, and then handed over the menu. "It just says 'cheesecake,' but I guess we could ask for strawberries."

Parse ended up being the one who called room service, ordering a steak and a piece of cheesecake for the two of them to split. They'd both had dinner earlier; but even if the skills tests were a joke, they still worked up a little bit of an appetite.

Or they had for Lyosha at least, after the run he'd done on the challenge relay. Parse had been in the fastest skater competition, and Lyosha assumed that ate up energy too. Maybe not enough for a salad to go with the steak and cheesecake, but enough to need some protein with the sugar.

After Parse hung up, he looked over at Lyosha and asked, "Are you in that group chat?"

«What?» Lyosha replied, caught a little flatfooted at the bluntness and abruptly re-readjusting his worries that he'd been too vague earlier. "--Yes."

"Hm," Parse replied, studying him as he leaned a hip against the nightstand.

Lyosha shifted on his seat on the non-luggage-covered bed. "Johnny say, you no want join?"

"Nah, I'm good," Parse replied; but he was definitely looking at Lyosha differently now, eyelids lowered slightly as his gaze drifted over Lyosha's forearms, bared ever since he'd rolled up his shirtsleeves after hanging his suit jacket in the closet.

Well, then.

Lyosha rolled his sleeves up a little more, above his elbow, and enjoyed how Parse faintly half-smirked as he watched him do it.  
  
  
They pretended to look at the television until the food arrived, and then they abandoned it to eat at the room's skinny desk, splitting one of the tiny bottles of whiskey from the mini-fridge to go with the meal.

Parse took the desk seat while Lyosha pulled over the sitting chair. They managed to get through the snack without elbowing each other too much, or banging their knees into the desk legs. The TV was still on, mounted to the wall above them; but Lyosha had long ago stopped looking at it in favor of watching Parse's lips and throat as he ate.

He was pretty damn sure Parse knew he had an audience from the way the other man meticulously licked every trace of cheesecake off his fork.

They had sex afterward on Lyosha's bed, with the TV still quietly playing for background noise. Parse _was_ good at giving blowjobs--he could go deep, and he paid attention to Lyosha's verbal and unable-to-verbalize-in-English cues, studying Lyosha's face through his lashes every time Lyosha forced his eyes back open to look at Parse as he sucked him off.

Lyosha liked that. He gently pushed Parse's bangs out of his eyes once Parse's hair gel started giving out, so that he could keep seeing that focus turned solely on him.

When Lyosha tugged Parse up on top of him afterward, so he could wrap a hand around Parse's long-ignored dick and get him off also, Parse didn't talk as much as Lyosha had expected.

He had to guess a lot at what Parse wanted him to do. But Lyosha managed to figure out enough of it; and Parse came soon too, his fingers curled tight around Lyosha's shoulders and his breath coming rougher against Lyosha's collarbone.

They stayed in the bed for a while afterward, with the television playing yet another reality show as Parse lay half-sprawled across Lyosha's chest and Lyosha ran his palm slowly along Parse's spine, feeling the sweat there dry. He half-wanted to go clean off, but not enough to actually pull away from Parse and get up to do it.

Eventually, Parse's phone timer went off, muffled slightly in its spot inside his pants' pocket on the floor.

Parse grunted against Lyosha's chest, and then pushed himself up on his forearms. "Curfew's in thirty.

"I'm gonna borrow your bathroom," Parse added, scooting off the bed.

"Okay," Lyosha replied, pulling himself back together.

Lazing around in bed with the man he'd just had sex with was a luxury. Being a hockey player in the same hotel room as another player, who needed to get back to his own room before Parse's roommate started wondering where he was at, was Lyosha's reality.

Parse went into the bathroom. And then he leaned back out the door and asked, "Tater, how many towels've you _used?_ "

"My room!" Lyosha retorted. Parse snorted in response before disappearing through the doorway again.

Parse showered and redressed quickly, and left with a brief wave over his shoulder and a "See ya tomorrow."

Lyosha locked the door behind him and then went to shower himself before heading to bed.

He tried to ignore the uncomfortable, disappointed feeling in his chest as he did.

The night wasn't going to have gone any other way. He'd already known that.

Parse was never going to stay. Not for all or even for most of the night. They'd only had a little while for themselves.

They had curfew. They were NHL players, at a heavily-press-covered event.

Lyosha knew better than to get greedy for impossible things.

*

They didn't hook up again before the weekend was over.


	2. Chapter 2

Almost three weeks passed before John texted the group chat with a string of laughing-crying faces, which was always a sign that somebody was about to get chirped.

And then John wrote: _Hey Tater apparently you suck at getting blowjobs???_

_I mean Parse said your alright at handys but like. How do you fuck up *getting* a bj bud??_

_LIE!!!_ Lyosha wrote back, outraged.

 _Wait why are you with Parse again_ Chuck asked.

 _We play Vegas tomorrow and flew in tonight._ John replied.

_So are y'all seroius fuckin or just cas'_

_I'm great at getting blowjob_ Lyosha grumbled.

_Cas_

_Lyosha stop embarrassing yourself._ Misha replied. Lyosha sent him a middle finger emoji.

Misha switched keyboards and added in English: _Why the fuck are you gossiping about Tater's dick? You want some of it, just ask, Johnny._

 _Somewhere else, I don't need to see that._ he finished. Lyosha sent more middle fingers in reply.

Chuck wrote, _Okay, quick poll. how many guys here as Parse slept with?_

John sent a double hands up. Nicke finally chimed in with _Me_. Lyosha pointlessly abstained. 

Tom said, _I thought we were, but then we played cards for an hour and he took all my money and told me not to cross-check his teammates in the neck again and pushed me out the door, the little bitch._

 _Oh my fucking god_ Chuck replied. _You tool_

Lyosha cackled despite himself. John mashed out about twenty emojis ranging from laughter to stand-in blue balls.

*

In early March, the Falcs flew to Vegas for their final game against the Aces. Parse had DMed Lyosha's Twitter in the late morning with _You guys coming in early enough to get dinner?_

Lyosha was pretty sure he grasped the subtext there. _Yes 3 p.m._

_Where you staying at?_

_Why, you want lie at John again?_

He semi-regretted the retort as soon as he'd sent it. The team was going to have plenty of free time before evening curfew, and Lyosha had no problem shifting his shopping and dinner plans to include sex with Parse. He'd enjoyed it last time.

And anyway, Parse was the one hitting him up now, so obviously Lyosha hadn't done badly by him no matter what he'd claimed. The little liar.

He was trying to figure out if _jk_ was enough to walk it back when Parse DMed a selfie.

From the background, it looked like he was in the Aces' common room. But Lyosha was mostly focused on Parse's expression: he'd tilted his chin down slightly to stare through his eyelashes straight at the camera with that sly little half-smirk of his.

It was similar to the look he'd given Lyosha that afternoon back at the All-Stars, only it was far more blatant. Lyosha was starting to suspect it was an intentional weapon.

Underneath, Parse had written: _Johnny seemed the type to go chirping you with that. Thanks for the confirmation._

An intentional, effective weapon. Lyosha maybe needed to reconsider his taste in men.

Well, he could do that another day. Lyosha sent back a grumpy face but then told Parse the hotel.  
  
  
Lyosha successfully chased his roommate out to an early dinner by pulling rank, which only worked because Davy was a call-up. But then Parse took forever to show up.

"Shift change, man," was all the explanation he gave when he arrived, shrugging as Lyosha locked the door behind them. "The casino staff are all gettin' out. I took the long way around."

It was way too early for rush hour--but, well, Vegas was a weird city. Lyosha huffed, but believed Parse and let it go.

It helped that Parse showed up with two takeout containers of good pelmini and proper sour cream. Lyosha tried one doubtfully, and then demanded the restaurant's name. Parse took a card out from his wallet and gave it to him.

"That's Scrappy's favorite place," Parse told him, as Lyosha was adding the restaurant's info into his phone. Parse was slouched in the desk chair, eating a pelmini over his cupped palm, his bare feet propped on the edge of the bed next to Lyosha's thigh. "I figured you'd like it."

"Bribe," Lyosha pointed out through a full mouth, even though he had no complaints. Ever since moving to Providence, he had to drive into Massachusetts if he wanted decent Russian food.

Parse lifted his shoulders with a half-smile. "Vegas, baby. That's how we do."

Lyosha snorted out a laugh and then had to quickly cover his mouth to avoid spitting sour cream onto his shorts. Parse grinned wider.  
  
  
They didn't manage to have sex. They'd barely finished the pelmini when Lyosha got a text--which he'd, thankfully, checked when Parse went to wash his hands--from Davy saying he was coming back.

 _Too fast!!_ Lyosha replied.

 _I don't feel good man_ Davy said. _I know you're talking with your fam, but it's like in Russian right? I can't speak that, say what you want._

Lyosha wished he'd come up with a better lie than that he was going to use his alone time to call his parents. But if Davy felt bad, there was nothing to do about it.

"You okay?" Parse asked, pausing in the bathroom doorway.

"Roommate come back," Lyosha said mournfully. "Sick."

"Ahhh," Parse replied; and then he headed over to his sneakers.

Parse pulled on his socks and shoes and left. Lyosha saw him to the door out of a life-long ingrained understanding of what was proper dating behavior, even if that was too formal for what he and Parse were doing.

Parse paused at the door, and then looked back at Lyosha with a raised eyebrow. "'Nother time?"

"Yes," Lyosha agreed, because even if Davy was sick screw him for wrecking Lyosha's afternoon.

Lyosha cupped the back of Parse's neck, and noticed the way Parse's eyelids dropped slightly when he did. "Goodbye? Or, you lie at John I'm bad kiss too?"

Parse took a second to sort that sentence out, and then smirked faintly again. "I dunno, would I?"

Lyosha belatedly remembered that he and Parse had never gotten around to kissing the last time they were together.

He barreled forward regardless. Sometimes it was better to be brash than certain. "No. I'm good kiss."

"Uh-huh," Parse drawled.

"Shut up, show you wrong," Lyosha retorted, before tugging Parse closer.

He wasn't lying. Lyosha knew he was good at kissing--he'd had lots of practice. When he was a teenager, before he left Russia to play Juniors in Canada, he'd dated a girl from a very traditional, religious household. Lyosha had mostly courted Lisa so he could spend lots of time kissing her in a stupid attempt to force himself into liking someone he **should've** been attracted to, while having a handy excuse to never push her for anything more sexual.

Later, he felt bad about it. Lisa had been an honest, kind person who had genuinely imagined her future intertwined with Lyosha's; she'd deserved better. The only thing that had stopped Lyosha from formally apologizing was the fact that Lisa had married while Lyosha was away in the Superleague.

According to all their old mutual friends, she was with a man who loved her and genuinely happy. Lyosha was glad for her; he didn't want to disrupt her life by bringing up an old relationship from almost a decade ago.

Or maybe that was a convenient excuse that spared him the humiliation of having to apologize. It was always hard to tell. Being a human being in the world was messy.

Parse kissed him back at first, but he eventually pulled away and gave Lyosha an indecipherable look.

"What?" Lyosha asked.

He wanted to pull Parse closer and kiss him more. He wanted to have the late afternoon with Parse that he'd imagined. He wanted to keep the door locked and make Davy go be sick somewhere else so that he and Parse could have that chance.

He wanted both his and Parse's situations to be different than what they were.

But Lyosha was used to wanting things he knew he couldn't have. He ran his thumb along Parse's spine one last time, and then made himself pull away.

"You're weird," Parse said after a bit, more bemused than mean. "...See you later."

This was the last time Providence and Las Vegas were playing each other this season, and Lyosha knew how slim the odds were that both the Falcs and the Aces would make it to the Cup finals to face each other. There was no telling when he would see Parse again.

Parse took another step back. Lyosha swallowed down a lot of unrealistic questions and instead nodded once. "Yes."

"Cool."

Lyosha shut the door behind Parse after he left, and then went into the bathroom and jerked off.

He still wanted more than he had afterward, but Lyosha knew how to live with that feeling. He'd feed it into the coming game, and drive himself to continue his current six-game point streak.

Davy came back to their room soon after, and then spent most of the night sick with food poisoning.

Lyosha felt bad for him, but eventually he dragged his blankets and pillows down to Marty and Thirdy's room and demanded to be allowed to sleep on their floor, because having to listen to Davy throw up hourly was seriously wrecking havoc with Lyosha's sleep.

Davy was scratched from tomorrow's game. Lyosha did poorer than he could be satisfied with, managing only one secondary assist. Parse had two assists against them, feeding passes to his linemates who proceeded to score on Snowy.

*

They didn't meet again until summer.

***

The next time Lyosha saw Parse was at the NHL awards ceremony in June.

The Las Vegas Aces were the 2011 Stanley Cup champions. Their final game had been less than a week ago; Parse was still wired on adrenaline and success in a way Lyosha had never seen before.

Lyosha was jealous.

There was no reason to deny it. Lyosha was at the ceremony as a finalist for the Calder's 'best rookie' trophy, but Providence had missed the playoffs. Snowy'd been injured in late March, and then the team went on a five game skid as their back-up netminder gave up goal after goal after goal after goal; and then the Falcs taking a playoff berth became mathematically impossible.

Lyosha had come back to the bench after his final shift in that fifth loss and immediately broke three sticks over his leg. He was too angry to keep it in any longer: angry at their goalie for collapsing under pressure, angry at his teammates for all their collective failures over the last several games, angry at himself for his own errors and undisciplined penalties and his inability to score enough goals to make up for them.

After the buzzer sounded, Marty had slung an arm over his shoulders as they trudged back to the dressing room, while Lyosha's anger slowly washed out to a deep, hollow disappointment.

Parse was at the ceremony because he was a finalist for the Hart trophy, as the player most valuable to his team. After already getting the Conn Smythe, when he was named MVP of the playoffs for leading the Aces to win the Stanley Cup.

At twenty years old. In his first year as captain.

Of course Lyosha was jealous. He knew that Parse had earned it all fair and square; but Lyosha wanted to earn his own successes too, and of course he wanted to prove that he was good enough he could do it all now. His feelings didn't have to be rational to exist. 

Parse had a blatant PR handler around him during the awards weekend.

The Aces must have been paying someone overtime. It seemed wise: Lyosha later learned that Parse had semi-chaotically fucked his way through every member of the group chat who was in town for the awards. Tom was the exception--he and Parse seemed committed to their grudge.

Lyosha wasn't sure where he had been on the list. With the way his time with Parse had gone, he didn't really need to know.  
  
  
Lyosha didn't win the Calder. Parse didn't win the Hart.

Lyosha was disappointed, but unsurprised. He'd known that he would have been informed earlier if he was going to win. That was why he'd told his parents not to bother going through the hassle of getting transcontinental flights in order to attend the ceremony--he didn't need them to come to Vegas just to watch him lose.

Parse was sitting a row away from Lyosha, but Lyosha could still mostly see him. If it stung Parse to lose the Hart, his media face was too good to show it.

Lyosha supposed it was hard to be surprised that the player who'd led the league in goals was named the winner. Even in just two years, it was clear that Parse was a playmaker: he always had a lot of points and plenty of assists, but fewer goals; and goals were the ultimate gauge of success in their sport. Sasha Ovechkin was the legend he was for a reason.

Or maybe Parse already had enough trophies this season, and was glad not to have to find space for any more hardware.

Probably not. Lyosha needed to put aside this jealousy already; he didn't like the petty way it made him feel.

He ran into Parse at the private after-party. Lyosha was navigating through the nightclub, heading to the bar for another water, when someone bumped a shoulder into his back.

"Hey Tater, you got plans tonight?" Parse asked.

Lyosha turned around to face him. "Dinner. Then no."

"You here? What room?"

Lyosha snorted despite himself. Yes, fine, they were in public with plenty other league people around, but still. Parse could try a _little_ finesse. "Parson, so fast."

Parse just shrugged briefly, still smiling. "I got like two minutes before Yves is outta the bathroom and starts freaking out I'm not there. You down? It's cool if you're not."

Lack of flirting game aside, Lyosha had no reason or inclination to reject him. "Okay. Floor seven, room...uh. I'm need look at key."

"Cool, let's go."

Lyosha paused. "Now?"

"Party's dying down, fan-work's done," Parse said. "My parents dipped. Why wait?"

Because the captain of the Stanley Cup-winning team disappearing in the middle of the after-party was going to be noticed, obviously. Lyosha's absence would get spotted too, if probably not as much. Parse was right, the fan-accessible post-ceremony party was over, but a lot of their own people were still here.

Lyosha hesitated another moment. Parse surreptitiously checked his watch.

Well, he knew it was stupid and that his agent and maybe some of the Falcs' PR staff would get annoyed at him if he was caught missing, but Lyosha wasn't the kind of man who ignored chances to get things he wanted. "Okay."

They skipped the elevator and went up the stairs for privacy's sake. They'd only made it two flights when Parse's phone started ringing.

Parse slumped his shoulders theatrically, but kept heading up. So Lyosha continued as well, even as Parse fished out his phone and said plaintively " _Pee slower_ " before answering. "You've got Kent."

Lyosha couldn't make out what the person on the other end said. Kent replied, "I'm just steppin' out for a little bit, c'mon man. Say I'm takin' my parents back to their room, they wanted to call it a night."

A few seconds later, he added, "Yeah, they left about ten minutes ago. It was gettin' kinda overwhelming."

Several moments after that, Parse said, "No, I'm hookin' up with someone. But do the parents story."

" _Again?_ " the man on the other end said in resigned exasperation, loud enough that Lyosha could hear. He added something else that made Parse snicker.

"I'll be back in, like. Thirty?" Parse promised; and Lyosha raised an eyebrow and wondered if he should feel maligned that Parse assumed he'd be done that fast. "It'll be fine, Yves. I'll see ya soon."

His handler clearly still had some problems. Parse said "Okay" several more times, but kept walking. When Lyosha pushed open the door to the seventh floor, Parse added, "I really gotta go, okay? We're in the hall now.

"Yeah, I swear," Parse finished. "See ya."

He ended the call and dropped his phone into his jacket pocket with a long exhale.

They _were_ in the hall, so Lyosha waited until they were safely inside his room before asking, "This is okay? You need go back?"

"Nah, they're just bein' paranoid," Parse said, rolling his eyes as he shrugged out of his jacket. "I haven't even had a drink since the champagne after the game, but they keep on actin' like I'm gonna go back to the Juniors shit, like. What's it gonna _take_ \--" and then he cut off.

Parse exhaled again, shorter, and folded his jacket with a shrug.

"But Boston's been hangin' Segs out to dry for his shit, so," Parse reversed, heading further into the room and away from Lyosha. He draped his jacket over the side table by the weird modular armless chair, and then looked out the plate window at the view of Strip. "Guess I'm lucky Vegas is trying to 'save me from myself' or whatever. Protecting their asset." He shrugged again, his back still to Lyosha.

«Ah,» Lyosha said.

He had heard there were negative rumors about Parse's time in Juniors, but he'd never bothered to look them up.

Lyosha had his own past that he wanted left behind him. There were plenty of times he'd been an asshole because he was trying to prove to others and himself that he was a real man, despite his then-unwanted attraction to other men. Lisa had only been the longest-running example.

Lyosha was done with being that callous boy, and he didn't want his present and future to be judged solely by his past self's actions. He tried to do the same for others.

Lyosha went over and cupped a hand around Parse's neck, rubbing his thumb along it gently.

Parse closed his eyes, and then took another slow breath as he relaxed a little of the tension in his back and shoulders. He dropped his head forward some, giving Lyosha more access.

Lyosha was happy to take it. He started running his palm along Parse's spine, glad that it seemed to be helping. There was no way he'd be able to say anything useful about moving forward from a past self to Parse in comprehensible English; but he could do this.

Lyosha was about to shift around to kiss him when Parse gave him a side-long glance, the corner of his mouth curved up slightly.

"Not anything you know about, yeah?" Parse asked. "You got a squeaky clean rep. Penalty minutes aside," he added, not hiding his smirk anymore.

Lyosha made a face. "I'm _try_ not go in box. Everybody chirp me, keep pushing."

"Yeah man, 'cause you fall for it so easy," Parse grinned, turning to face him. "Five chirps and then you're swinging and off to the sin bin, not one-timing their net. Why would anybody _stop?_ "

The coaches have all told him pretty much the same thing, occasionally with more frustrated cursing. Lyosha scowled. "Take ten chirps, shut up."

"Fuckin' make me," Parse replied automatically, staring Lyosha in the eyes, his grin widening enough to show the edges of his teeth.

Later, Lyosha would sometimes wonder if things still would have changed between him and Parse if they hadn't hooked up that night.

It was hard to imagine. The previous two times they'd met, it had always been the easy shallowness of two semi-strangers expecting quick, casual sex.

When Lyosha had first moved to Ottawa for Juniors, the Russian trainer he'd billeted with had also served as Lyosha's translator, English tutor, and general explainer of all the ways that North Americans were weird.

Kolya had told Lyosha a metaphor that helped a lot with the last one. He'd explained that Lyosha's Canadian and American teammates were like peaches: soft on the outside, smiling and overly-friendly on the surface, happy to talk and share information about themselves as long as it stayed shallow; but if you tried to really get to know them, you hit their pit, the deeply-personal information that they kept private.

Lyosha, Kolya'd said, being Russian, was like a coconut: careful with information about himself until he knew someone could be trusted, and then friendly and loyal once that person proved they deserved to get through his outer shell to his soft inner self.

«Of course they seem fake,» Kolya had told him, during Lyosha's first month on the team when culture shock and his limited English kept him mostly silent--and frustrated about it--in the dressing room. For weeks, Lyosha had been compensating by coming back home and talking Oksana's ear off until she pushed him out of the kitchen; he had a feeling she'd asked Kolya to finally do something about it. «But that's just how they are. They think similar--we seem cold to them. You'll adjust.»

Lyosha had tried to behave a little more like the North Americans after that. In some ways it was hard: he really was working on his English, but speaking up raised the risk of making a mistake and getting chirped for it and feeling humiliated in consequence. But he made himself do it anyway.

It got easier after the team captain finally cussed out in front of everybody the one guy who tended to make the most fun of Lyosha. Campbell never said anything to Lyosha's face again after that; and Lyosha didn't care about the opinions of cowards who talked behind his back.

In a lot of ways, it was easy. Lyosha knew he was gregarious. He liked being happy and around others. He liked people in general, until they gave him a reason not to. People were interesting and complex. Trying harder to get to know his teammates and coaches was worth the risk of being potentially mocked or taken advantage of.

Besides, it was maybe a little easier for Lyosha to understand the North Americans than it was for Kolya. If Lyosha was supposed to be a coconut, then he was still one with his own pit inside.

He'd kept the fact that he was gay to himself back then. It was his own closely-guarded private inner self, one he didn't share with anybody even if they'd gotten through his shell. Zhenya was the first person Lyosha had ever admitted it to, and he'd been terrified speaking the words until Zhenya had shaken his shoulder comfortingly and told him he wasn't the only one.

Parse was the most peach-like American Lyosha knew. Everything about Lyosha's relationship with him was surface-level: they'd only had sex once, only talked a few times--and then only about hockey or TV or blatant flirting--and they lived on opposite sides of the country. They knew almost nothing about each other.

Parse might've brought Lyosha pelmini the second time they met, but he'd never joined the group chat and he didn't invite Lyosha into his home. They'd never even exchanged phone numbers.

It was hard to imagine how their future could have gone the same way if they hadn't gotten together on that particular night, when Parse was still riding high enough on adrenaline and endorphins from winning the Cup that he occasionally spoke honestly, and when Lyosha still had enough low-grade jealousy simmering under his skin that he reacted to it against his better judgment.

"Okay," Lyosha said.

Parse narrowed his eyes slightly, but he kept grinning that challenge at Lyosha, unmoving.

Lyosha's hand was still on Parse's back. He dragged it up once more to his neck and then tightened his grip slightly, watching for Parse's reaction carefully even as a tight, nervous energy started to twist up inside him. Parse inhaled slowly, studying Lyosha through lowered eyelids.

Lyosha maybe wasn't great at English yet, but he knew how to read body language. He tightened his hand a little more and started walking forward, herding Parse up against the built-in closet.

Parse jolted and then tensed up when his back hit the door, though. So Lyosha took a step back and pulled his hand away, sliding it down to rub Parse's bicep through his sleeve instead. When Parse relaxed a little, Lyosha cupped his face with his free hand and kissed him.

Parse opened his mouth to deepen the kiss at first. But then a while later, he bit Lyosha's upper lip out of nowhere. Lyosha yelped and tugged Parse's hair reflexively, pulling him away.

" _Fuck_ ," Parse breathed, tilting his head back further and resting it against the door, eyes shut.

When Lyosha let go, Parse grabbed his wrist and put Lyosha's hand back on his hair. "No, do that."

Well, then.

Lyosha could read body language, but he preferred words, even if it had to be English. Knowing what Parse wanted was a lot better than guessing.

He gripped a good handful of Parse's hair, even though it was difficult. Parse had cut it at some point in the past week, probably whenever he'd shaved off his beard. When Lyosha had watched game 7 for the Cup, he'd noticed that Parse's hair hadn't been trimmed in a while--it was long enough that it was getting curly, sweat-soaked and plastered against his head as Parse had thrown off his helmet and joined the dogpile of his teammates who'd swamped their goalie and were screaming in joy after the buzzer had gone off and the Aces had won 4-3.

Parse swallowed at that. Lyosha watched the way it moved his bared throat, thinking vaguely about how Parse had sucked his dick last time. He leaned down to kiss the underside of Parse's jaw.

He knew he couldn't bite, even though he wanted to, just to find out if Parse would like that too. They had to go back to the party later; Lyosha couldn't leave any marks. Though he might change his mind if it turned out Parse had bit his lip hard enough to cut it--it still stung.

Parse swore again quietly and slid his hands under Lyosha's jacket, gripping the back of Lyosha's shirt and tugging him closer.

Lyosha went happily. He pressed up tight against Parse, pulling on his hair to tip Parse's head further so he could reach more of his jaw. He wedged a leg between Parse's thigh as he did, to make up for the sting to his scalp.

" _Fuck_ ," Parse rasped. His nails dug into Lyosha's back as he ground against his thigh, and it felt good enough that Lyosha wound up biting the tender underside of Parse's jaw just a little.

Parse made a harsh noise--and then suddenly he was letting go of Lyosha and squirming to get off of Lyosha's thigh.

Lyosha pulled back, worried that he'd overstepped or pushed too far. But then Parse went to his knees and started fumbling with the fly of Lyosha's pants.

"Oh," Lyosha managed with a shiver. Well, he definitely hadn't overstepped then.

He was getting too warm. Lyosha unbuttoned his suit jacket and shrugged it off, tossing it blindly behind him at the chair as Parse got his pants open and dragged them and Lyosha's underwear down his thighs.

It pinned his legs oddly--Lyosha had to brace a hand against the closet door to steady himself. He grabbed Parse's shoulder with his other one. "Wait."

Parse had been digging a hand in his pocket, but he looked up at that. "What's up?" he asked, pulling a condom free.

"Oh," Lyosha repeated. "No. No, yes, condom. Is right size?" he asked, unsure. He and Parse used different brands; Lyosha didn't know if that affected measurements.

Parse gave him a look that was half making fun of him and half indulgent. "I remembered you."

Lyosha shivered again, and then bit down on his tongue as Parse opened the condom packet.

Parse jacked him off until Lyosha was fully hard, and rolled the condom onto his dick before pulling Lyosha a little closer. Lyosha had to shuffle forward because of his pants; but he didn't care about looking stupid right now, not when Parse was licking his mouth as he wrapped a hand around the base of Lyosha's dick.

Lyosha braced his forearm against the door with a groan as Parse started to suck him off, before dropping his head so he could watch. A few seconds later, he remembered to curl his fingers back into Parse's hair.

Parse's eyes drifted shut at that. Lyosha was starting to figure out that that was a good sign, so he pressed his nails a little harder into Parse's scalp.

Parse shivered hard and made a satisfied noise, and started deep-throating him.

Lyosha groaned again and thumped his fist against the door, swearing. He tried to remember how to say "That's so good" or at least something close enough to make his point.

Parse pulled back, shifting Lyosha's dick out of his mouth. Lyosha made an embarrassing disappointed noise, and forced his eyes open. Parse was looking up him, his head arched back awkwardly into Lyosha's palm. Lyosha stared distractedly at his mouth.

"Hold still," Parse ordered, smacking Lyosha's hip before going back to sucking his dick.

Lyosha did his best. It was good to have something to focus on--it kept him from coming too soon, and he wanted to stay with this for as long as he could: Parse's shoulders brushing Lyosha's thighs as he trembled, the little focused crease in Parse's forehead as he sucked Lyosha off, his eyes still closed in satisfaction.

Lyosha had to stop looking, eventually. It was becoming too much. "Parse--"

Parse pulled off him again. Lyosha managed to swallow down his whine this time. "You close?"

Lyosha nodded once sharply.

"Okay." Parse tugged Lyosha's pants further down. "Get these off."

Lyosha kicked off his shoes and pants, and then removed his socks and tie and shirt as well when Parse told him to. He didn't pay attention to where he tossed them. If his suit was a wrinkled mess after this, well, it was worth it.

Lyosha belatedly remembered that the light was on and the curtains were still wide open. He dragged them shut awkwardly, trying to keep his erect dick from being visible to the whole Las Vegas Strip as he did. PR would have a fit. The group chat would chirp him so hard Lyosha would be forced to murder them all for his sanity.

When he turned back, Parse had loosened his tie, but that was it. He was still on his knees and fully dressed, hair disheveled from Lyosha's grip as he gestured to him. "C'mon, Tater."

Lyosha was starting to feel a little awkward about being completely naked when Parse was fully clothed. But, well, Parse was the one on his knees and visibly hard from taking Lyosha's dick down his throat. If this was some kind of power play to make Parse feel more confident despite his vulnerable position, all right, Lyosha was fine with that. He was a professional athlete; he was used to being naked. If Parse wanted to look, Lyosha was happy to let him.

Parse grabbed his thighs and pulled him closer when Lyosha stopped in front of him once more. Once he'd moved where Parse wanted him--pinning the other man between Lyosha's bulk and the closet door--Parse started sucking his dick again, this time clearly intent on getting Lyosha off. Lyosha braced his forearms and his head against the door, and watched.

When he was too close to fight it off any longer, Lyosha dug his fingers back into Parse's hair, a little harsher than he'd meant to. Parse glanced up at him and didn't break his rhythm.

"Close," Lyosha managed hoarsely.

Parse gave him a thumbs up. Lyosha snorted out a laugh, and then shuddered when Parse pressed his tongue heavily over the head of his dick once more.

He let go of Parse's hair so he wouldn't accidentally yank it when he came. Lyosha braced his forearm back on the door while Parse continued going down on him, his fingers curling as he felt his orgasm build up tighter.

It didn't take long to break. Parse kept sucking him off as he came, digging his fingers hard into Lyosha's thighs in warning when Lyosha rocked too roughly into his mouth. Lyosha thumped his fist against the closet door again and struggled to hold still.

Soon, he had to drop a hand to Parse's shoulder and push him back. "Stop. Too--feeling."

Parse let his dick slip out of his mouth. When Lyosha managed to open his eyes again, Parse was leaning back, his shoulders pressed against the door as he stared up at Lyosha.

"Fuck," Parse said roughly, watching Lyosha's face as he wiped off his mouth. He rubbed his dick hard through his dress pants for a couple moments before forcibly pulling his hand away. He held it up to Lyosha instead. "Help me up."

Lyosha did, frowning when Parse winced hard as he stood slowly, openly favoring his right leg. "Okay?"

"Yeah," Parse replied, dragging off his tie. "Just playoffs. You know."

"No," Lyosha replied, pulling the condom loose and tying it.

Parse paused at that, and then huffed slightly as he tossed his tie at the desk. "...Sorry. Wasn't tryin' to be a dick."

"You leg okay?" Lyosha asked again, dropping the condom in the trash.

Parse shrugged as he started unbuttoning his shirt. "It'll be fine."

Lyosha apparently wasn't going to get more out of him than that, so he quit trying and started undoing Parse's pants instead. Parse quickly grabbed another condom from his other pocket before returning to his shirt.

Parse didn't take forever to get out of his clothes, but it felt that way to Lyosha. He hadn't been joking about the toll of playoffs: Parse had multiple still-healing bruises, including an ugly faded one near his sternum that Lyosha was pretty sure was from the spear he'd taken in game 6. There was no visible injury on his right leg, which made Lyosha more concerned. Invisible injuries were usually worse.

Parse pushed him backward toward the bed, and Lyosha went.

When Lyosha's calves hit the mattress, Parse shifted past him and crawled up onto the coverlet. Lyosha turned and enjoyed the view.

He was used to the body mass loss that hockey's long season caused, but the extra months of playoffs had burned down Parse further. He was all sinew and muscle, even more so now than how Lyosha remembered him back in January.

Lyosha was abruptly more aware of the difference between them. He'd already finished his vacation and begun his offseason conditioning, working to build back up his weight and muscle mass after the end of this season. Parse probably hadn't even had a full day off yet, between the playoffs and the media aftermath, and he definitely hadn't been able to do any more conditioning beyond the typical in-season struggle to maintain equilibrium. Lyosha was hardly where he'd be at when next season started, but he still had height and some more weight over Parse.

Parse swatted the fancy, long decorative pillow off onto the floor and flopped over onto his back, sideways across the bed. He opened the condom package before beckoning at Lyosha. "Tater, _c'mon_."

It was another order, but a borderline frantic one this time. Parse's dick was dark and dripping onto his stomach as he rolled the condom on. Lyosha didn't remember seeing him touch himself earlier, except that one brief time through his pants. He had to need some friction by now.

Lyosha didn't remember Parse touching his dick when he'd sucked him off last time, either. He wondered vaguely if maybe Parse had a thing about that, and climbed up onto the bed. Parse shifted his legs open wider to make room for him.

Lyosha started to kneel between his thighs to suck him off, but then Parse hooked his hands under Lyosha's armpits and tugged him up further.

Lyosha went, and dropped down when Parse pulled at him, settling heavily on top of the other man but taking care to keep his weight off of Parse's bad leg.

" _Fuck_ ," Parse groaned roughly, dropping his head back over the edge of the mattress. "Good."

Lyosha grinned. He squirmed around until he could get a hand between them and on Parse's dick, and then started stroking him the way he was pretty sure he remembered Parse responding to best last time.

Once he had the right leverage to do that without straining his wrist too much, Lyosha shifted again and caught a handful of Parse's hair. He pulled on it hard, forcing Parse's head backward even more over the edge of the bed.

Parse swore again loudly, shuddering hard under him before wrapping his arms tight around Lyosha's back to hold him in place. He hooked his good leg around Lyosha's thigh a breath later.

Lyosha grinned wider.

So much of Parse's throat was bared to him, and Lyosha still couldn't do anything there, even though he was almost sure now Parse would enjoy it. They both had to go back to the party eventually.

He made do with biting a hickey onto Parse's collarbone instead. Parse jerked under him with a stifled noise and dug his nails into Lyosha's back; but when Lyosha lifted away reflexively, Parse dragged a hand up to his hair and pushed his head down until Lyosha's mouth was back on his shoulder. Lyosha figured that was a pretty clear indicator that he could keep going.

So he did, concentrating on keeping his hand in the right tightness and pace around Parse's dick and on biting down just hard enough that Parse kept shivering out those raspy, harsh breaths without going so far that he broke the skin.

Parse came for him quickly, leaving Lyosha equal parts proud and disappointed: glad that he'd done such a good job in getting Parse off, but still wishing he'd been able to enjoy doing it for longer.

Well, maybe he could convince Parse to come back to his room once the rest of the evening was over. Lyosha kept stroking Parse's dick through his orgasm, listening closely for any indication that it was becoming too much; but Parse never tried to squirm away or push his hand off.

Lyosha finally stopped when he felt Parse softening in his palm. He let go of his hair as well, and smoothed it down for a few moments before pushing himself up. Parse's arms slid limply away from his back as Lyosha shifted over and sat up next to him.

He urged Parse to scoot forward enough that his head was on the mattress. Parse did, but then slumped back onto the coverlet as soon as Lyosha stopped tugging at him, his eyes still shut as his breathing slowed.

Lyosha ran his hand over Parse's hair again, futilely smoothing down his cowlick and wiping away the sweat along Parse's hairline. He was a little surprised at how slack Parse was now, so much more settled than he'd seemed all day earlier. Lyosha didn't remember him looking this satisfied after the last time they'd had sex.

Well, it'd clearly been a better orgasm this time. _Try lying to John this time, little brat_ , Lyosha thought in amusement as he worked the condom off of Parse's dick. He tied it closed before lobbing it at the trashcan. It missed.

Lyosha made a face at it and decided to deal with that later. He smoothed Parse's cowlick down with the side of his hand one last time, and then slid his knuckles along the side of his face. Parse tilted his head slightly into the touch, but didn't open his eyes.

"I'm get towel," Lyosha said, still smiling.

Parse mumbled something that Lyosha interpreted as "'Kay." He chuckled and scooted off the bed.

By the time Lyosha had wiped himself off and brought a new damp washcloth out into the room, Parse was asleep on top of the coverlet, curled on his side with the blanket from the foot of the bed dragged over his shoulders.

Lyosha stifled a laugh, and made a mental note to figure out a good stamina chirp before Parse woke up.

He washed off properly in the bathroom sink. He got water everywhere, but it was better than having the noise of a shower get Parse up. Lyosha dried off and headed back into the room, not bothering with clothes.

He climbed slowly and carefully onto the bed. Parse stirred a little as Lyosha settled down behind him, but then he drifted back off. Lyosha readjusted the blanket over them both before draping an arm lightly over Parse's side and closing his eyes, relishing the rare opportunity to actually sleep with someone.  
  
  
Lyosha dozed in and out of half-sleep for a while until the sound of a phone woke him.

It wasn't his ringtone. Lyosha blinked his eyes and woke up more, and finally realized the noise was coming from Parse's coat.

"Parse," he said, rubbing the other man's arm. Parse curled in tighter, pulling away. "You phone."

Parse didn't move for a few seconds. Lyosha was about to try shaking him to wake him up; but then Parse reached past him, flailing at the pillows until he got a handful of one. He dragged it over and pressed it against his face before screaming muffledly.

Lyosha sat up, frowning in concern.

Parse held the pillow over his face for a few more silent moments. And then he took a deep breath, and let out an even longer one, and finally sat up, tossing the pillow back at the headboard as he did.

"Parse?" Lyosha asked as the other man shoved off the bed.

"One sec," Parse replied, fishing his phone out of his jacket pocket. He managed to answer it before it switched to voicemail. "You've got Kent."

"Kent, it's been an hour," the man from before said, now sounding significantly wearier. Parse must've hit speaker.

Parse carried his phone over to the desk, fixing his hair and studying his face in the mirror as the man added, "I have to write reports every night. You've **heard** how loud my laptop is. My wife won't let me write them in the same room with her."

Parse smiled insincerely in the mirror, and then rubbed his mouth with his wrist. When he dropped his hand a breath later, his smile had changed to something that made Lyosha think of media interviews.

"I dunno if it's your laptop, man," Parse said in amusement, collecting his shirt. "I think you just type like you're tryin' to wake the dead."

Lyosha realized just how significantly Parse's body language had changed. It wasn't the shoulders-tight frustration he'd had as he walked over to the phone seconds earlier; now, he was back in the same loose, relaxed manner he'd had all afternoon, going through interviews and working the crowd of fans during the public party.

"The harmony of my home life relies on me being able to write _short_ reports," the man continued, blatantly wheedling.

Parse laughed out loud. It sounded real; but Lyosha wasn't sure any more.

The man added, "The GM is glaring at me. I can't dodge him much longer. Tell her goodbye, you have to come back already."

"Alright, alright man, I'm comin'," Parse said, going to collect his boxer briefs. "Gimme like, fifteen minutes."

"I literally can't dodge him any longer, Kent. He pays my salary."

"Dude," Kent replied--and for a second a thread of irritation was audible in his tone. It was gone by the next words. "Tell him I stayed to visit with my parents for a while so I could get off my ankle. Elliot knows I been gripin' 'bout it, he'll back you up."

He went into the bathroom and shut the door behind him. Lyosha couldn't hear any more of the conversation after that.

He got off the bed slowly and went to get dressed.  
  
  
Kent showered quickly and came back out in his underwear and shirt. He'd apparently stolen some of Lyosha's gel to fix his hair.

"What is wrong with your ankle?" Lyosha insisted. He'd had enough time to go over the sentence that he was almost confidant he had the grammar right.

Parse exhaled through his teeth as he pulled on his pants. "It's fine. I got the surgery scheduled for Monday."

« _ **What**?_» Lyosha demanded. "Why--?!" He waved a hand at the carpet by the closet door.

"It's _minor_ ," Parse said in exasperation, sitting down on the bed to put on his socks. "I had trainers crawlin' up my ass about it all month, don't you start."

"You dumb," Lyosha told him bluntly.

Parse stuck his tongue out at him, and Lyosha deeply wished he could remember the English for 'immature.' "Dude. It's minor surgery, Tater. Chill out."

Lyosha grumbled and tossed Parse his tie.

Parse finished dressing, double-checked his hair in the mirror one last time, and then turned for the door before hesitating. Lyosha looked over.

"--Hey," Parse said, pulling his phone out of his suit jacket. "What's your number?"

"Uh..." Lyosha replied, going over to his phone. He knew he should know by now, but looking it up was less of a nuisance than memorizing it.

As they were exchanging numbers, Parse added, "I told my parents I'd get dinner with them alone. They're not really into all this fancy stuff." He waved a hand at the door, indicating Lyosha supposed the whole hoopla of the awards ceremony, or maybe Vegas itself.

"Ah," Lyosha agreed. "I'm have dinner with friends."

Parse nodded.

And then he hesitated again, still not looking up from his phone. ". . . You heading out tomorrow, or--"

Parse's phone rang.

Lyosha watched him close his eyes and tighten his jaw for a long moment.

And then Parse exhaled slowly and rubbed his wrist over his mouth again until he was smiling politely.

He slapped Lyosha on the shoulder with a "Catch you later" and headed out. Lyosha heard him answering the call as the door closed behind him.

Lyosha blew out a long breath and wondered just how bad Parse's Juniors reputation was that the Aces were this paranoid about him. He knew other teams had their own problem players that they had to manage carefully, but this seemed excessive.

Lyosha deliberately made the choice once again not to go looking up Parse's past, and instead went to throw away the condom on the floor.  
  
  
He hung back in his room for a while after Parse left, so it wouldn't be too obvious that they were returning to the party together. Lyosha checked his messages to kill the time.

He had multiple texts from Zhenya. The first one told Lyosha to come to his table and meet one of the comedians who was at the event; the next couple asked why he was taking so long; the one after that asked where he'd gone; and then it had clearly become obvious that Parse was missing too, because the last several texts were Zhenya chirping Lyosha for not being able to keep his dick in his pants a couple more hours, before saying that he'd cover for him.

That was kind, but ominous. Seven times out of ten, Zhenya's 'covering' for someone involved making up an embarrassing story when they weren't there to stop him. Lyosha prepared himself for the worst and headed back out to the party.


	3. Chapter 3

Parse texted him later that night, once the afterparty had wrapped up.

Lyosha had gone to dinner with Misha and Zhenya and several of Zhenya's broader circle of friends. Some of that group weren't aware that Zhenya was bi, Lyosha knew; and they certainly didn't know that both Misha and Lyosha were gay. That was the only reason Lyosha got away with repeatedly texting Parse at the table with only minimal chirps about his rudeness from Zhenya.

He got an awful lot of significant looks from Misha, though. Lyosha steadfastly ignored them.  
  
  
Misha bullied him into riding back to their hotel in his own rental car instead of getting a taxi back, because he was an old busybody. He gave Lyosha an unimpressed look when Lyosha said as much.

«Stop taking taxis,» Misha told him as he started the car. «You're too old for foolish, risk-taking behavior.»

Lyosha rolled his eyes, and looked back out the window at Vegas' flashy, self-aware excess as they headed for the street. «This is _America_ , Misha. A taxi is just a taxi.»

«Until it isn't,» Misha replied flatly.

Lyosha let it go. Misha was older than him, and his uncle was a FSB man. Misha's paranoia was reasonable enough for his life. «This isn't about the taxis, Misha.»

Misha glanced over at him for a moment, but his reflection in the window was too dim for Lyosha to gauge his expression.

«It's fine to have fun, Lyosha, but keep it casual,» he said, looking back at the road. «Don't go dragging your heart into things it has no place being in. 'What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,' right?»

Lyosha turned to give him a frown. «What is this?»

«Do you have any idea how saccharine you looked every time you answered your phone at dinner?» Misha replied. «I needed a drink just having to see that.»

Lyosha made a face and looked back out the window. «Shut up, I did not.»

Misha snorted disparagingly. Lyosha scowled more.

«Do you know how many men from the chat Parson's slept with while we've been here?» Misha added.

Lyosha knew full well that the question shouldn't have stung. There was nothing exclusive between him and Parse. They were fellow gay professional hockey players who'd hooked up a few times, and that was all.

Well, that's what it had been. Maybe things were changing between them, a little.

Either way, Lyosha knew for sure that nothing would change if he strangled the possibility out of self-protective cynicism before it ever had a chance. «No.»

Misha started to respond. Lyosha added, «I don't need to, either.»

A long moment later, Misha exhaled and shook his head.

He slapped Lyosha on the shoulder a few times before putting his hand back on the wheel. «It's your own life, Lyosha. But I don't think some of these choices you're making are going to leave you happy later on.»

«My future self can tell me when I get there,» Lyosha replied. Misha just made an resigned noise.

*

Lyosha went over to Parse's condo early the next morning, for breakfast and sex before he had to head to the airport.

Parse made them scrambled eggs with chunks of kielbasa mixed in, and spinach-blueberry-whey protein smoothies. Lyosha recognized the conditioning-style menu.

"God, yeah," Parse grumbled when Lyosha chirped him about it. "I swear, when I retire, I'm never fuckin' eatin' eggs again."

"You no like eggs?" Lyosha replied through a mouthful of them, frowning. How could anyone not like eggs? And these were good.

Parse just made a face as he cut off the blender. Lyosha made one back at him.

"Never drinkin' this crap again, either," Parse declared, which Lyosha considered a bad way to serve someone a drink.

"Smoothie?"

"Friggin' whey powder," Parse said, pouring the smoothies into a couple glasses. "I'm gonna buy the biggest drum of it I can find and set the whole thing on fire."

Lyosha snorted as he took the glass Parse pushed across the kitchen island toward him. "Have party. No photos."

"Oh shit," Parse grinned, looking up abruptly. "I could do it on my birthday. Stick sparklers in it! You think that'd work?"

"No," Lyosha ordered, not entirely sure Parse was still joking and starting to wonder if he'd ever been. When did the mania of winning the Cup usually wear off for guys? It'd been over a week.

Well, Lyosha would find out himself someday. It wasn't this year; but there was always the next one.

Parse dumped the emptied blender into the sink, still grinning. "Think I could get it through carry-on, goin' back home? Or would they freak out about it bein' a bunch of powder?"

" _No_."  
  
  
He and Parse had anal sex for the first time that morning.

Well, it was Lyosha's first time. The downside of trying to make himself straight during most of his teenage years, and of being closeted to the point of near-celibacy while he was playing in the Superleague, meant that Lyosha hadn't had much sex in general--and almost none of the kind that required more effort than a hand or a blowjob.

He tried to pretend he wasn't nervous. He was pretty sure it was obvious anyway.

But if it was, Parse didn't call him out on it. He mostly just chirped Lyosha for how raptly he watched as Parse prepared himself, sprawled out on his bed with a leg hooked over Lyosha's shoulder, one arm tucked behind his head and his other hand between his thighs as he worked himself open.

Parse obviously knew how good he looked like that. Even when he wasn't teasing, he watched Lyosha with lidded eyes and that little half-smirk of his, which was both annoying and, frustratingly, made him even hotter.

Even after Lyosha finally bit the inside of Parse's thigh and then started sucking a hickey onto it in retaliation, Parse just chuckled breathily. Lyosha _really_ needed to reconsider his taste in men.

But once he was ready, Parse said Lyosha could fuck him however he liked, as long as Lyosha kept his weight on him and didn't accidentally hit his bad ankle. The near-complete freedom was too much; Lyosha had so many fantasies, but now that he could try any of them, he froze up trying to pick just one.

It was almost a relief when Parse finally pulled away from where Lyosha had been playing with Parse's balls while he tried to choose and rolled onto his stomach, dragging his hair back as he groaned, "Tater, fuckin' _come on_ already!"

With Parse starting to sound frustrated with him, it was easier for Lyosha to just decide and act. Except then he had to deal with the fact that his dick kept slipping in the lube and sliding along Parse's taint instead of into him, like Lyosha was trying to get it to do.

It **really** didn't help when Parse started giggling into the sheets. "Oh my god Tater, I hope you aim like this next time we play."

«Shut up,» Lyosha retorted, his face heating more with embarrassment. It never looked this hard in porn.

Parse shifted a hand back and patted him obnoxiously on the thigh, which was also _not helpful_. Lyosha caught his forearm with the hand not currently steering his dick and twisted Parse's arm around to pin it to his back.

Parse's laughter broke off as his breath hitched. Lyosha tightened his jaw and concentrated on getting this right and finally sliding _in_.

He experimented a little, once he was fully inside Parse and after Lyosha no longer felt like he might immediately come if he moved. Parse had gone quiet again under him, breathing harder with his eyes shut; and he pliantly shifted into whatever position Lyosha's hands urged him to go.

Lyosha took care to be mindful of his bad ankle. After last night, he didn't fully trust Parse to say anything about it, now that he was so clearly deep into the sex.

He found out that pinning both of Parse's arms behind his back and moving with short, hard thrusts not only felt good, it also caused Parse to make little choked noises that he tried to stifle into the mattress. Lyosha got a grip on Parse's sweat-damp hair and forcibly turned his head to the side so that Parse couldn't hide the sounds, and desperately tried not to come too fast.

Lyosha was pouring enough of his focus into that goal that he was caught by surprise when Parse suddenly jolted beneath him with a gasped " _Fuck!_ "

Lyosha started to kneel up to get a better look at him. "Parse?"

"Don't stop," Parse rasped, so Lyosha fumbled back into the rhythm. Parse shuddered hard and squeezed his eyes shut tighter.

Lyosha kept it up for several more confusing moments as Parse jerked and cursed harshly against him, his voice pitched up in a jumbled mix of shock and want and near-panic. He kept snarling "Don't **stop**!" at Lyosha any time he started to hesitate or slow the pace.

And then Lyosha finally realized, with a sharp, hot twist in his belly, that Parse was struggling so hard because he might be able to come for him like this. Parse might come first this time, rutting against the mattress without a hand on his dick, all because of the way Lyosha was holding him down and moving inside him.

Lyosha hadn't thought it was possible to really get off from being fucked--he'd thought that was another thing porn made up. He'd been half-resigned to being the one who came first yet again, given how things had gone the last couple times.

But now that he'd realized there was a chance he might be able to help Parse come this way, there was absolutely nothing Lyosha wanted to see more.

Lyosha tightened his grip on Parse's hair and yanked until Parse shouted with another harsh shiver.

And then Lyosha bit down on his own lip until he split it open, hoping that the sting would be enough to fight down his own orgasm, and focused everything he had on fucking Parse the way he needed from him. Parse swore louder, and then shuddered heavily with a strangled moan when Lyosha bit his shoulder hard.

Parse soon came for him, cutting off mid-curse with a choked sob as he did. Lyosha tried to keep fucking him as Parse shook through his orgasm, but he'd already been holding back for as long as he could stand.

So he finally quit fighting. Lyosha let himself come with a groan, his mouth pressed to the trembling muscles of Parse's back. Parse swore softly again.

Several heartbeats later, Lyosha let go of Parse's forearms. He slumped down heavily on top him, barely remembering to keep his weight to the left, away from Parse's bad ankle. Parse pulled an arm up and buried his face in the crook of his elbow, still shaking.

Lyosha shifted a little further over and then pulled out, making Parse jerk again with another stifled noise. Lyosha kissed his shoulder, and reached over to gently rub a thumb over the teeth marks on Parse's other shoulder, wiping away the bit of blood that had smeared there after Lyosha'd bitten him.

Lyosha settled onto his side a few moments later, stroking a hand over the back of Parse's head to soothe any lingering ache from when he'd pulled his hair. Parse swallowed hard, but didn't move.

They stayed like that for long enough that eventually the condom Lyosha was still wearing began to feel gross. He had almost worked up the energy to pull his hand away from Parse's hair and deal with it, when Parse drew a deep breath and then exhaled slowly.

"Shit," he mumbled into his arm; and Lyosha liked how his voice was still a little hoarse. "...That was good."

The side of Lyosha's face was tucked against Parse's bicep. He turned his head a little and smiled openly against Parse's skin.

"Bad aim at start, game-winner at end," Lyosha told him, with maybe just a little bit more smugness than was absolutely necessary.

Parse snorted out a laugh. Lyosha grinned wider.  
  
  
Parse fell asleep again this time, not long after he'd let Lyosha prod him onto his side. Lyosha curled up against his back.

Lyosha draped an arm over Parse's waist and half-dozed as well, ignoring the drying come on both of them, and how he was starting to get a little hungry again, and the fact that he'd inadvertently wound up in the wet spot. None of those were significant enough annoyances to be worth passing up a chance to linger in bed after sex.

But it didn't last. Far too soon, Lyosha's phone alarm went off.

Parse stirred against him. "Wha?"

"My phone," Lyosha told him. He kissed the lingering bite mark on Parse's shoulder, and then made himself sit up. "I'm have go. Plane, two hours."

"Oh," Parse mumbled, "yeah."

A moment later, he pointed an arm lazily at the bedroom door. "Bathroom's on th' right."

Lyosha ran a hand along Parse's bare spine one last time, because he wanted to touch him. And then he forced himself out of the bed. "Okay."

He justified taking a full shower and using Parse's soap and shampoo, because obviously Lyosha needed to be clean enough to make it through the long flight back to Providence. He pretended it wasn't because it would let him smell Parse for a little longer, even after he'd left.

It probably wasn't pretending if Lyosha knew full well that that was why he was doing it.

Lyosha sighed and rinsed the conditioner out of his hair. He'd definitely dragged his heart into something it probably had no place being in: something that no longer felt casual anymore, even if Lyosha wasn't sure what else this thing between him and Parse could possibly be.

Well, he supposed he'd find out as the future came.

Parse's hair product was some kind of maximum strength gel that immediately flattened Lyosha's hair against his scalp, to his horror. He spent almost ten minutes trying to fix it without just straight-up washing it out and starting over, until the next warning alarm went off on his phone.

Parse dragged himself out of bed once Lyosha was finished dressing, and drowsily went with him to the front door without putting any clothes on, which was unnecessarily distracting. Lyosha exercised his willpower and kept his eyes up.

"What'dja do to your hair?" Parse asked. "Y' look like you dunked your head in syrup."

Lyosha scowled. "Why you have very bad hair gel? Too--heavy."

"Nothin' else keeps my hair from gettin' curly," Parse answered. "...Why'd you use my gel?"

Lyosha refused to answer that, because Parse looked like he was waking up enough to soon put two and two together and start chirping Lyosha exactly as much as he knew he deserved. He kissed him goodbye instead.

Parse kissed him back at first; and then he pressed his tongue hard against the barely-healed split in Lyosha's lip. Lyosha flinched and pulled away.

Parse gave him that smartassed little half-smirk and showily licked his bottom lip, staring him straight in the eyes.

Lyosha spent two seconds genuinely weighing the expense and hassle of booking a new, later flight against how much it'd be worth it to get to shove Parse back into the bed and fuck that look off his face once more. He didn't _really_ need to be anywhere until tomorrow morning....

And then Lyosha summoned a level of impulse control he'd never before managed and pushed Parse at the doorway that separated the front foyer from the rest of the condo. "Don't show dick in hall."

Parse snickered and waved a hand over his shoulder as he went. "See ya, Tater."

*

He got a text from Parse a couple weeks later. Lyosha was in Toronto; he had some obligatory league media work and a photoshoot for his new endorsement to do, plus one last meeting with his North American agent, before he could finally head home to Russia for the offseason.

The text was a photo of a small drum of whey protein powder, sitting on some grass, with a sparkler stuck in it. Un-lit, thankfully.

Parse had added underneath: _I vetoed the m80._

_Why???_ Lyosha wrote back.

Parse's reply was just different fireworks emojis and the U.S. flag. **Americans**.

_You dumb_ Lyosha informed him. _No play hockey without hand, foot_

When he checked his phone again after the photoshoot, Parse had finally replied. _It's not really whey. That shit's too expensive, my parents'd kill me for wasting it. I bought baking soda and dumped it in a old jar_

Lyosha'd seen his fair share of Mythbusters. Most of the English washed over him, especially all the technical comments, but he liked watching the cast build all their weird things. He definitely remembered the episode where they blew up a bunch of powder in a cannon.

He had to look up the English word he needed, and then texted back: _That still flammable_

He didn't get an answer until he was finished changing. Parse sent, _Nah that's flour. Baking soda's the stuff you put on grease fires_

Non-hockey English. He hated it. Lyosha translated 'baking soda' and googled just long enough to determine that that sounded legitimate, and then shook his head. _Why_

_Yolo_ Parse wrote back, which was not a good reason.

Lyosha was deeply tempted to tell him as much; but his agent was waiting outside. They were supposed to have dinner together, to re-review some visa details and other fiddly contract stuff, and to go over Lyosha's obligations to his endorsement in the coming season.

So instead he just sent an eye-rolling emoji, and then silenced his phone before heading out.  
  
  
He didn't see the next text from Parse until late that evening, when he was back at his hotel. Parse had sent it maybe an hour ago: _I forgot to account for human error_

There was a video attached. When Lyosha hit play, it was that same drum of not-whey powder on the grass, except that it was dark now.

Lyosha, fully aware he was being trolled, propped his phone against the desk lamp so he could watch while changing out of his suit.

"--so this is serving as my official proof that, per the Las Vegas Hockey Club's ban list, I am not handling any fireworks tonight," Parse announced in the phone. Lyosha tried to hold down a smile as he hung up his suit jacket. "Even though it's totally lame I can't celebrate my birthday with even like, a sparkler."

"I can't believe you're really doing that," a woman laughed.

"They're still mad about the potato gun," Parse replied. "I gotta have proof."

"I'm still callin' BS on that!" a guy yelled from the side. " _No way_ did a bunch of real pros do that."

"Your prerogative, man," Parse said casually.

Far away, somebody hooted. "Look who's got the fancy words now!"

Parse ignored that. "Anyway--"

"Just light the sparkler!" the first guy ordered. "We played fire hockey together!"

"Jonah, shut it," Parse said dryly, making someone off-camera laugh. "--Becky, if you're havin' to listen to this for some reason, that was years ago and it was for, like, a minute before the captain showed up and ripped us all a new one for being idiots."

" _That's_ putting it lightly," said a man with a French-Canadian accent, who was apparently standing closer to Parse given how clear his voice was. Parse snerked once.

"I though Jack was gonna murder me for real," Jonah added. " _ **Man**_."

"Served you right," the French-Canadian replied. "Arrête de faire le cave."

Jonah called, "Screw you, Michel!"

"Anyway, I'm holdin' the phone with one hand and here's the other," Parse continued, sticking a hand into view. "So I am obeying all--"

"Jonah, watch it!!" another woman shouted.

The picture blurred as Parse shifted around. Lyosha caught sight of trees and what looked like a chair partly on fire, before the camera dropped down to the grass.

"You dumbass," Parse called, laughing. The video kept showing grass; somebody was cracking up nearby. Further away, a baby started crying.

"Shit, how do--"

"Chill out, get the hose," Parse ordered with casual authority, switching to the kind of tone Lyosha reflexively associated with alts and captains. The video shifted again as he started walking. "Hold up."

The screen blurred further as Parse lifted the phone. **Something** was definitely on fire in the background; and then Parse cut the video off.

Lyosha shook his head, still snickering. He sent back _Everyone ok?_ before hitting replay.  
  
  
He didn't get a reply until morning, when Parse sent him a photo of a charred Adirondack chair in the early light, sitting in a backyard that seemed to end in trees instead of a fence. _Can you believe this dipshit has a baby?_

It took Lyosha a shamefully long time to figure out that Parse was talking about the guy who set the chair on fire last night, not the chair itself, which obviously made no sense. That's what he got for checking his phone before making coffee. _Unlucky kid_

_I can't wait til she's old enough I can tell her all the stories of her dad being an idiot_

Lyosha snickered as he filled up the room's coffee maker. _You bad friend_

Parse replied: _I hope she becomes a goalie, that'll teach him._

Lyosha laughed, and then cursed when he accidentally spilled some of the water onto the desk.

*

Lyosha kept that video for a long time, even after things between him and Parse started getting rockier. He ported it through two new phones, and transferred it to the burner he got in Russia during the lockout. He kept it for a few years past the last time he'd ever watched it, and for several months after he'd finally deleted Parson's contact information and texts.

He wasn't particularly proud of that. Lyosha knew he was being sentimental and stupid.

But it was hard to delete his last reminder of the man who had meant so much to him once, and who still meant more than Lyosha knew was rational or deserved.

It was hard to erase his last reminder of the person Parse used to be.


End file.
